Places
Enter Dreams The journal of Diejed, third son of the Daemon, scribe of the middle dimensions: ~*~ Sakura thought she was a normal teenage girl until she traveled through a magic portal. Sakura follows her father into the portal and plans on rescuing him. The search takes her to a boy named Rory who is a sorcerer. The two of them learn that they can find and open portals to other worlds. Follow them on their adventure! ~*~ Sakura's adventure starts in the world known as Earth. The history of this world is widely known so I will not go into details. Sakura was ignored there; she survived but never lived. The adventure really starts when Sakura leaves Earth and begins to explore new worlds. I will begin by explaining the first world Sakura enters. A monster is sent to Sakura's house. She thinks that it is there to get some papers but the truth is much more complicated than that. The monster takes Sakura's father, ensuring that she will follow it through a portal. So Sakura finds herself in Yakived, the world full of forests and mysteries. A network of thin roads connects cities in the center of the forests but travel is hard. The forests are full of monsters that are better avoided. One class of people travel through the forests: the messengers. The messengers are the life blood of Yakived. Their society could not exist without them. No one could move through the forests without the messengers. They train their people to do just that. Sakura spends weeks training to be a messenger so that she can move through the forests and get to the palace where her father is being held as a prisoner. The Messenger training is the only thing that keeps Sakura alive on this journey. ~*~ Along the way, Sakura meets a variety of creatures. Sakura speaks with a fae who is from a different dimension called Torarbos, about the destruction of worlds and learns of an evil creature that she must be wary of. Torarbus was destroyed by a creature made of hate and hate seems to flourish wherever it goes. There is a way to stop hate though and that's what makes Sakura meet three more creatures: sorcerers, Jaguars, and dragons. ~*~ Fae Short Story: There were not many other travelers on the road. The messengers' path was renowned for being dangerous and very few people could survive the training the messengers were given. Everything was made to toughen them up so that they could survive a harsh winter here in no man's land. So, Sakura was very surprised to see another traveler on the road after walking for three days without any sign of civilization. "Finally! Another living thing capable of rational thought!!!" The old man spoke quickly as if he was afraid that Sakura would suddenly disappear if he stopped speaking. "Why not make camp together, Young Messenger? It is getting dark and any company is precious on this path." The man did not need to ask Sakura twice. She readily agreed to share a camp. It did not take long to make tents and a dinner with the two of them working together. They worked in silence but concentrated fully on their different jobs. The two travelers sat down to eat when the old man spoke again. "Every good traveler deserves to hear a great story after a long day." He smiled at Sakura like a kind grandfather and began his tale. "Once, long ago, the Earth was divided into several races. Some travelers and merchants may tell you that fairies or elves ruled over all the races with magic, mystery, and justice. Although this sounds like a wonderful story, it is not true. There were no fairies or elves and justice was a thing of the past even then. The races fought – yes." Sakura was not sure but the old man's wrinkles seemed to get less deep as he continued the story. She liked the idea that the man sitting next to her was not really a warrior or even a prince in disguise. "Many wars, both magic, and mundane were fought but the side with right on its side did not always win. I know that this is a sad thought but it is a true one. Luckily, the side with the strongest warriors and the most men in their army did not always win either. It seems to me that not very many people think about this simple fact, especially those who are warriors. Still, the winners of the battle are the ones that get to tell the tale to all others in the end. Strangely, in the winners' version of the war always puts them on justices' side. This simple fact makes some people forget that there is more than one side to each story. People have stopped caring about the facts of things long in the past. I am one of the few left who knows how to dig through a thing and find the truth of it. I am looking for the one tale that must be recorded." Now the old man was no longer old at all. He was a tall man with hair darker than her father's and skin as pale and smooth as a sheet of paper. All the wrinkles and all the color were gone. The man no longer seemed human. He was something else… There was a strange power radiating through him and off of him as if he has never seen the sun or ever known love. "What are you?" Sakura demanded of the strange thing before her. "I am a member of the First Race: the Fae. I am a traveler searching for treasure, like many of the other travelers I have met before. The difference is I am not searching for gold, silver or jewels. I am looking for something so rare… there is only one in all the worlds." He paused as if he was not sure if he should tell the girl the rest. Still, he continued, "I am looking for the sorcerer." Sakura shacks her head, unsure of what the traveler was trying to tell her. His body bent and shifted like one possessed but then even more unusual things began to happen. The man shifted and changed. He was no longer a man. He was quickly becoming a reptile or a lizard…. Sakura could not tell what this man really was. All she knew was that she had never seen anything like him. "What are you?" "I have already told you," the other voice hissed. "I am the last faithful fae. The others have forgotten about the fae but I search faithfully." "What does that even mean?" "It means that I trick others into making chaos. It is an easy job because everyone wants to create chaos. Take your own race, any man will lie to save himself and if everyone lies than the truth can no longer exist. How can something be true if no one can know the truth? But I do not care about your people or their truths. I care about myself and my own high ground… my own victory!" The thing breathed in and out in a harsh, gasping breath as if it was too excited to breathe. The truth hit Sakura then and it was so suddenly realized that it came to her mouth before she could even filter it. "You're no fae. You're only a daemon… the great thing you used to be has been eaten away by hate and selfishness." Sakura had spent weeks and weeks studying this for one of her "projects". She had read all about these Spirits and Daemons. She also knew that both creatures needed to be respected… and that her months of research had barely even delved into the pool of knowledge about these magical creatures. "You dare accuse me, human," the creature said in a deep, hissing, almost unworldly voice. "You, who are part of the evil clan who made me what I am today?" "I never did a thing to you. I am only here until I can find my father and get home!" Sakura practically yelled the last statement to the beast. She had been trying to keep her motives secret for so long that now she had no choice but to let them spring forth. "You have done nothing to stop it either, have you?How does one world affect the other? No human in either world respects nature or obeys the old laws that keep the world in balance." "That isn't fair! None of this is supposed to be real! If you want help then show yourself to the other worlds." Sakura was angry – so angry that she no longer paid attention to what she was saying or how to say it respectfully. "Ignorance of the law is no reason to break it," argued the beast. His face changed again as he spoke. Now, he was a giant lizard with sparkling fish scales covering every inch of his body but his head was now that of a human. Black hair streamed from his head in long waves that almost touched the ground. Sakura breathed in a deep breath for courage and breathed out slowly before she spoke again. "You're right. Human beings are doing some evil things to the world but only other humans can stop them! We have made mistakes but now we have to atone for them by fixing them. Letting anger rule you will only make you want to kill the humans. How will things be fixed if we are all gone?" The creature stopped and put his lizard hand on his human chin as if deep in thought. "You and other humans like you want to fix this problem?" The creature asked the question as if the very idea of it astounded him. "I don't know how many people want to change but sometimes it only takes one person to start something big." "I think you already have more than one person on your side." The creature leaned his head towards the girl as if he had a terrible secret to tell her. "There are rumors of another man, a man who sees with something better than eyes – something without hate." A light came to the daemon's eyes like maybe he was not really a daemon. Maybe there was some of the spirit still in this Fae folk. Sakura felt a deep hope in her heart but in the instant, the light came to the creature's eyes it vanished and was replaced with blackness. "Only two, maybe three at the most, humans are left who want to help the forest… such a small number want to help the spirits but all the others do not only harm us out of ignorance… They want to harm us! The Sorcerer will stop them all!" The creature let out a loud roar that was so high-pitched that it matched the pitch of fingernails on a chalkboard. Sakura shrank back as far as she could to the tall tree behind her. This creature was unpredictable. What happened next made Sakura go over her encounter with the creature over and over again in her mind. The fae had walked over to her and disappeared. He was gone… nothing was up there put a fallen tree. ~*~ All three of these creatures reside in the dense forests and can destroy the unwary. Even trained messengers must be on their guard with these monsters about. Sorcerers and Dragons both originated in the world of Kingston. They made their way to Yakived during the Great Desolation. Great changes to climate and leadership brought such danger that fear itself made a gateway between worlds that remained open for all. Creatures, humans and monsters alike all made their way to Kingston, where things were safe. Smaller predators were destroyed because of all the extra predators from Kingston. Jaguars were big enough that they did not have that problem. The Jaguars of Yakived are one of the largest carnivores in the world. They can weigh as much as a ton and stand taller than most houses. Unlike the Jaguars of Earth, Jaguars on Yakived communicate through speech. They have more in common with humans than with other large cats and often make their dens near human settlements. Records show that the Jaguars have even adopted humans and taken them into the pack.